Northern Rail to be nationalised from March

Northern Rail is to be nationalised, the government has announced today.

The struggling operator will become publicly owned from March 1st, after years of awful service.

The Department for Transport announced it’s putting the government-controlled Operator of Last Resort (OLR) in charge of running services, Sky reports.

Mikey / Flickr

Transport Secretary Grant Shapps warned that ‘frustrated commuters will not have to wait long’ before action was taken against it, earlier this month.

Northern, the North of England’s largest rail commuter service, has been plagued by issues, with customers forced to put up with an abysmal service.

According to official figures, only 56% of Northern trains arrived at stations within one minute of the timetable in the year leading up to December 7th – compared to an average of 65% across Britain as whole.

El Pollock / Geograph

On Wednesday, Mr Shapps told the House of Commons the Northern franchise was: “no longer financially sustainable and would only be able to continue for a small number of months”.

He added: “This is a new beginning for Northern, but it is only a beginning. Northern’s network is huge and complex, some of the things which are wrong are not going to be a quick or easy to put right.

“Nonetheless, I am determined that Northern passengers see real and tangible improvements across the network as soon as possible.”